


At the Edge of the Water

by DistracttheGoddess



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: F/M, Injury, Longing, One Shot, Solo, UST
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-27
Updated: 2017-06-27
Packaged: 2018-11-19 20:43:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,817
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11321367
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DistracttheGoddess/pseuds/DistracttheGoddess
Summary: After taking a rough blow from a dragon, Vhella finds herself needing assistance when bathing one evening.





	At the Edge of the Water

She knows camp is a shout away. One shout and someone would be over quickly to help her. The only problem was she's naked. So that limits her options. One stupid dragon and suddenly she can't bathe herself properly. It's an embarrassment. Try as she might, her shoulder will not twist to let her wash her own back.

She could, in all honesty, simply give up the goose, but it has been quite a while since she had felt fully clean and she wasn't willing to quit. After a particularly spectacular failed attempt to lay the washrag against a rock and move her back against it, which only resulted in her washcloth dropping into the stream and rinsing off her soap, she decides to ask for help. Tears spring up in her eyes and she reprimands herself for being an idiot. She didn't like feeling helpless and had been able to repress it lately, but she is tired and sore and she just _wants to be clean dammit_. She manages to reign herself in before she stomps her foot petulantly.

Sighing, she re-lathers her cloth and she blinks off the tears, regaining control of her emotions. Staring in the direction of camp, she faces a choice. With Wynne and Leliana having some kind of religious fervor in the woods somewhere with that pouch of holy ashes, they are both out of the question. Morrigan wasn't in camp when they'd returned from the temple, off somewhere with her grimoire from the Circle. Sten isn't even a consideration. She doubts the Qunari would even answer her call. So that left Zevran or Alistair.

Zevran would most definitely offer his assistance, and several offers to assist in other ways (“Surely you will not be able to pleasure yourself this evening, I can offer my humble services, should you require.”) While the thought of his quips was amusing, she decides that Alistair is probably the best choice. She simply didn't have the energy to keep up with the high energy rogue.

The other warden might tease her about her needing help, but she could count on him to help her quickly and leave her to her own devices. Yes, this was the safest option.

“Alistair?” she calls loudly. “I need your help.” Maker's mercy, she's already flushing in shame and he hasn't even arrived. She's a grown-ass elf who can't even clean herself. There's a long moment where she wasn't sure if he'd heard her.

Then she hears him making his way through to the clearing. “Something you need?” His hand covers his eyes and she could tell by the crinkle of his forehead that his eyes were firmly shut behind it.

“I, uh, I can't get my back. Will you help me?”

His head falls back and she sees him mutter something to himself. “Wouldn't you rather wait for Leliana or Wynne to return?” His voice sounds strained.

“No,” she replies tartly. “I don't want to wait in a chilly stream for who knows how long until they return. It was either you or Zevran. If this makes you uncomfortable, would you please go ask him to come-”

His sharp “NO” cuts her off. He clears his throat when she's silent. “That is, I mean, I can help.” he offers helplessly.

“Then you will have to open your eyes.” she says with a small smile.

“Right, yes,” he says, removing his hand. She watches as he takes a deep breath and opens his eyes.

She's sitting in the water; her chest down submerged. Leaning against the edge, she holds up the cloth. “With my shoulder like this, I can't seem to,” she gestures vaguely behind herself.

He swallows thickly and steps forward to take the cloth from her.

The quiet seemed to be permeated with awkwardness. She moves to sit on an underwater ledge, and he closes his eyes again to preserve her modesty.

After she is situated on the ledge and her red curls are tossed over her uninjured shoulder, she covers her breasts with her arms and calls him over. His eyes open and he let out a soft strangled sound. She looks sharply at him. “Are you alright?”

He clears his throat again. “Yes, just-. Yes.”

She feels him move to sit behind her and suddenly she realizes he was not the safe choice. She can sense him almost physically though they weren't yet touching. When he runs the soapy rag up her spine, she lets out an involuntary sigh.

He quickly pulls the rag off, “Did I hurt you?”

Despite the chill of the night, she feels her face flame. “Uh, no. Not at all. It just- it felt really nice.”

“Oh.” She feels his hand return, fingers splayed under the rag. He rubs small circles across her uninjured shoulder in an almost massage. The soft cotton running across her skin causing parts of her body to wake up she'd prefer to stay dormant.

He dips the rag in the water lightly grazing her hip and then running it across her back. She feels the cool water bead down her skin. The pressure of his fingers behind the cloth causes heat to pool in her abdomen. He pauses on her lower back, his thumb making small massaging circles near her spine and his fingers spread almost around her side. His large hands on her made her feel small and fragile, a feeling she hadn't had in quite a while. In a slow concentrated movement, he works his way up until he reached her bruise; his fingers spread barely a breath from her breast. His touch is an exquisite torture, lighting a fire that she couldn't quench.

This was not the safe choice. This was the choice that activated the part of her mind she hoped she wouldn't have to face. This is forcing her to face her monumental attraction to the man behind her head on; a hyper-awareness down every inch of her own body of how much she ached to have him touch it all.

The only sound was the soft babble of the small waterfall leading into her bathing alcove. She focuses on her breathing. She hopes to keep it even. If she relaxes, her breathing would become ragged, she was sure.

Alistair pauses. Vhella isn't sure if he's as conscious of how close he is to her breast as she is or if he simply is staring at her bruise. She finds herself begging the Maker for Alistair to drop the rag and touch her, actually touch her. The moment, both of them frozen seems to last several minutes but likely not more than moments.

He disrupts the spell as he makes a soft slow stroke across her lower back, just above the water line. She lets out a quiet whimpering moan. Her eyes fly open and her shoulders stiffen in embarrassment, but if he heard her, he gives no indication. He simply runs the cloth across again and up her back to her sore shoulder. With a gentleness she would not have considered him to have, he carefully caresses the bruised part of her body.

He runs the rag over the top of her shoulder and rests it on her upper arm. Breathily and close to her ear, he murmurs, “Anything else you need, my dear?”

She turns her head and her green eyes meet hazel. “Alistair,” she whispers back, not sure if she was answering his question. She feels him lean in toward her.

“THAT DAMN DOG!” Morrigan is back at camp and violently breaks the haze that had enraptured them. Alistair drops the rag into the water and scrambles up.

“If that's all, I'll be in camp,” he says quickly. He all but runs back through the brush.

Vhella lets out a mortified groan and slides into the water. The coolness of the spring feels calming on her flaming face. She stays under as long as her lungs allow, staring up at the stars through several feet of water. It's quite beautiful, but it does nothing for the mood that has taken hold of her. When she resurfaces she finds Morrigan staring down at her from the bank.

“Your dog left this in my unmentionables.” She holds up a dead hare.

Irritation at the situation causes Vhella to snap, “Can't be stinkier that what normally goes in them.”

“I'm just going to pretend I didn't hear that. I'll just leave this with your dog and you can sit here and wallow in whatever it is that has bothered you so.” With that Morrigan heads back to camp.

Vhella sighs and thumps her head against the soft grass of the bank. Now she has to apologize to Morrigan _and_ Alistair.

Maker, she had almost kissed him. Wanted to, definitely, but he couldn't get away from her fast enough. Hopefully, she hasn't ruined the friendship she had easily built up with him. He means a lot to her now and if she had thrown that away in a moment of heat she would never forgive herself. Best case scenario is he tells her they can just forget it when she gets back to camp.

At least that's the best case scenario she'll let herself consider. Imaginings of long nights spent curled up together in her tent are firmly pushed back into the recesses of her mind where they'll stay.

 

<><><>

 

Alistair had run from the creek directly to his tent. He ignores the pointed questions from Zevran about what kind of help the other warden had needed specifically. He tosses off his shirt before he falls down heavily onto his bedroll.

Maker, what was he doing? He should have just let Zevran do it. He ignores the spike of jealousy the simple thought of that shot through him. He's never going to get her out of his head now. His eyes close and with a perfect clarity recalled how the beads of water crawled down her back, hugging the curves of her delicately muscled back; how a loud crass voice in the back of his mind demanded that he lean forward and follow the trail of one of those beads up her back with his tongue. And he's touched her now. _Touched her_. Granted, it was over a cotton cloth, but still, he knew what her body felt like under his hands, how those muscles moved together when she stretched slightly or turned.

_And the_ _sounds she made_. Those soft moans and sighs she didn't even seem to realize she was making had unmistakably affected him. Then she whimpered. Based on how she'd stiffened in response, she was aware of at least that sound. That didn't stop him from trying to get her to make it again. That whimper had almost undone him.

Alistair can't help wondering though if his hands were on her in a different context, would she make those noises? Others? He choked back a groan at the thought. That would give Zevran far too much information about what had happened, or rather, not happened down at the water.

She'd looked so fucking perfect sitting on the edge of the water like that. Red hair tossed artfully over one shoulder ( _Did she know what that would do to him?_ ) and her clear green eyes looking up at him, so trusting, arms covering her modesty. The otherwise perfect scene marred only by the swollen bruise mottling her shoulder. A stark reminder that he couldn't keep her safe all the time. That he couldn't constantly keep his shield between her and the world.

That was probably the reason his hand had started the massage without consulting his brain. Being hurled against a stone wall by a high dragon definitely made for a rough day, and that wasn't even the half of it. He'd just wanted her to feel good, even if it was only for a few minutes. After the day she'd had, she deserved it, deserved so much more, but he could only do so much.

A sharp jerk of his brain brings him right back to the more recent past in which he'd almost kissed her. He would have, certainly, if not for that witch's intervention. He could still feel her breath against his face as she whispered his name, hot and close. So close. It would have been so easy to have closed that distance. If only they'd gotten to that point two minutes sooner. He could have had her laying down next to the bank, _kissing other places_. No no no no. Stop it stop it stop it, he told his brain, but other parts of his body were already egging it on.

Oh, and nevermind that he'd almost kissed her, the voice in the back of his mind said impishly, he was basically groping her breast at one point. The temptation of the moment was almost overwhelming, simply to slide his hand forward and cup her chest, but he knew he would never, not without knowing if she reciprocated these feelings. Every fiber of his being screams that he wants her needs her. Maker, he'd never been this hard in his life.

He rubs his hands over his face trying to think of something else, anything else. But nothing will stick in his head the way she has. Taut muscles and soft sighs. Would she sigh as she crested under him, or scream? Could he make her moan again, hands exploring the rest of her forbidden body? Would she look at him with heated green eyes or close them to the pleasure he desperately wanted to give her?

He feels himself straining against his breeches. The determination not to touch himself to her, not to feed this growing obsession, quickly evaporates as his need grows. He slowly drags his hand down his body, pausing only a moment before sliding into his waistband. He stifles the groan as he grasps himself. Heightened sensitivity an evident side effect of touching her so intimately. He lets out a long shaky breath trying to regain some of his sanity and take the edge off. It does not work.

He lowers his pants, freeing his erection. He palms the head and the pleasure shoots through him, causing his back to arch and his mouth to open in a silent gasp. He closes his eyes and imagines her small hands caressing him instead of his own. He tries to take it slow, to savor this sensitivity that has taken over him. Tries to keep his hips from bucking into his fist, his body begging for release.

He hears her return to camp and he freezes. Zevran tries to ask her questions about what happened but she deflects them all and tells him that she's going to lay down. That it was a long day and she's just exhausted. He hears her climb into the tent next to his and lay down.

He hasn't moved. Still rock hard in his own hand, frozen with indecision. Can he finish with her this close? Yes. _Of course, he can_. But would it be wise? If she heard his desperate biting moans and knew he was reacting to her presence, would that drive a wedge between them? ( _Would she join him in his tent?_ ) (Stop it, you.)

The decision is made for him when he hears a soft moan from her. He's sure that it was a pained moan from her shoulder, but his mind runs with the idea that she's doing the same as him and his body reacts of its own accord. His hips buck into his hand until he resumes stroking himself. His thoughts full of her touching her body to thoughts of him. A whispered “Alistair” echoes from his memory and he finishes himself embarrassingly quickly. Praying that he wasn't making noise, but honestly too far gone in his fantasy and feelings to even notice. He peaks imagining those whimpers and sighs coming from her as he loses himself in her and his name whispered against his ear in ecstasy as their bodies crash together.

He shoots onto his stomach, white ropes stretching across his abdomen. Taking deep slow breaths, he cleans himself off with a spare pair of undergarments then shoves his shame deep into his pack where it will reside until he can break away from the group to tend to his soiled clothes. Laying back down he stares at the side of the tent, knowing that she's mere feet away and he can't touch her. The pain of his longing springs hard in his chest. He wants her. There is no going back now and certainly no denying it. He wishes he could just throw caution to the wind and join her in her tent, but their mission was too important to risk for his selfish pleasure. Tired as he was, he didn't think he'd get much sleep that night.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Comments = love


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